The fledgling Pirate Party of Canada is offering Canadians a way to get around increased Internet monitoring by a Conservative government, Edmonton-based leader Mikkel Paulson said Tuesday.

It will provide a virtual private network, or VPN, service to Canadians. And, for every VPN account that Canadians buy, it will offer a free account to a person living in a country like Tunisia or China, where Internet access is restricted. The account would allow uncensored Internet browsing.

The party set up a server last January to help Tunisian protesters avoid detection and prosecution by their government. The party is buying more space to offer the service to other countries. A VPN account gives people a working Internet proxy, which encrypts and reroutes all the Internet traffic from their computer through a third party so that governments or hackers can’t get access.

If given a majority government, the Conservatives are promising to ram through a bill that would provide unprecedented systematic interception and monitoring of Canadians’ personal communications. In short, Canada will soon join the growing list of countries subject to invasion of privacy and internet censorship. Therefore, the Pirate Party is preparing to extend the services presently offered to residents of repressive regimes to protect the people affected by the aspiring dictator right here at home.

“We will provide VPN service to Canadians at a rate of $10 / 200GB. For every paid account we open, we will also provide a free VPN account to a citizen of a nation with censored internet,” said party leader Mikkel Paulson today. “This allows us to simultaneously provide protection to Canadians and expand our humanitarian support abroad. We won’t keep logs of the activity, although we will of course cooperate with law enforcement in the event of abuse of our services.”

Until such a time those in power begin to respect the rights of those they claim to represent, the Pirate Party will work to defend Canadians from the abuses of their government.

2 comments:

This is a (particular) strategy that has worked well for minor parties in the past. Integrating yourself in the community, and providing some benefit trickles up in favor of the party in future elections. It's why I think the Green Party of PA running Sheriff candidates in poor neighborhoods with many tenants is a very good strategy. If their candidate(s) were to win, and provide the immediate benefits to the constituents, well, they may very well just go "Hey, I think I might just vote for that party in other elections!"

This is a strategy the Vermont Progressive Party used as well for their (successful) party building.